Invisible

About the book

You could say that my railroad, the Madham Line, is almost the most important thing in my life. Next to Andy Morrow, my best friend.

Lots of people think Doug Hanson is a freak -- he gets beat up after school, and the girl of his dreams calls him a worm. Doug's only refuge is creating an elaborate bridge for the model railroad in his basement and hanging out with his best friend, Andy Morrow, a popular football star who could date any girl in school. Doug and Andy talk about everything -- except what happened at the Tuttle place a few years back.

It does not matter to Andy that we live in completely different realities. I'm Andy's best friend. It does not matter to Andy that we hardly ever actually do anything together.

As Doug retreats deeper and deeper into his own reality, long-buried secrets threaten to destroy both Doug and Andy -- and everything else in Doug's fragile world.read more

Reminded me a little of I am the Cheese. The boy in the story is living in a fantasy world. He has one friend, who is very cool and popular. He is obssessed with his train platform.The main character can hardly relate to anyone his age. He is stalking the prettiest girl in school. He has huge problems. We find out why later in the book as ther pieces of the puzzle come together.read more

Critics' Reviews

No rating provided

Publishers Weekly

In a starred review, PW wrote, "Hautman once again proves his keen ability for characterization and for building suspense in this painfully sad novel," which centers on an introverted math whiz's downward spiral. Ages 12-up. (Nov.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

The strength of Hautman's (Godless) painfully sad novel is the wisecracking but clearly unreliable voice of its narrator, 17-year-old Douglas MacArthur Hanson who admits, "I'm not only disturbed, I'm obsessed." One of his passions is "Madham," a town he's building for his model railroad, complete with a 1:800 scale replica of the Golden Gate Bridge. He's also fixated on a pretty girl who clearly wants nothing to do with him. And he's overly reliant on his only friend, Andy Morrow, a fellow junior who is the popular and outgoing yang to Dougie's outcast and introverted yin. Hautman expertly teases out the truth about a tragic incident that occurred "at the Tuttle place" three years earlier, a mystery that propels the story to its horrific conclusion. Dougie is as mathematically gifted and socially inept as the autistic narrator of Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, but he also has a sophisticated wit. During a lapse in conversation at one of his $95-an-hour therapy sessions, he observes, "We stare at each other for about $1.40." His self-deprecating comments and wry observations make his spiral into self-destruction all the more heartbreaking. (One measure of how sympathetically the author has portrayed him is that even though he stalks a classmate, you root for him to get away with it.) Hautman once again proves his keen ability for characterization and for building suspense. Ages 12-up. (June) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

In a starred review, PW wrote, "Hautman once again proves his keen ability for characterization and for building suspense in this painfully sad novel," which centers on an introverted math whiz's downward spiral. Ages 12-up. (Nov.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved